


Nicky and Andrew clears up a few things with Neil

by elfiethewicked



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: in which I clear up something that's been bothering me, like seriously why isn't this taken up more often, maybe its's just me that has a serious problem with this
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-09
Updated: 2018-04-24
Packaged: 2018-10-29 23:26:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 5,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10864326
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elfiethewicked/pseuds/elfiethewicked
Summary: After a successful game Neil let's it slip that Nicky kissed him that first night in Colombia. Andrew is not happy.This is really me getting closure because the book didn't give it to me.





	1. Chapter 1

They were on the way to the locker rooms when it happened. They were celebrating a good win, one that Neil had guaranteed them with a particularly good goal. When he went of the court, Dan had lifted him off the ground in a bear hug, Matt had insisted on giving Neil a piggyback ride and even Kevin didn't have anything negative to say. Nicky was positively bouncing around Neil and Matt as he retold the highlights of the game in a dramatic manner.

"… and then, Neil ducks under, you hear that ladies and gentlemen, he ducks under the backliners racquet and scores! Man, Neil I could've kissed you!"

"No thank you, I would prefer if you didn't do that again" 

It was an innocent comment, and a innocent reply if it hadn't been the "again." 

"What, you've kissed Nicky?" 

"No, Nicky kissed me, there is a difference," said Neil. All the foxes had stopped in their tracks. This conversation had taken a turn that started to feel unpleasant. There was a question hanging in the air that no seemed to want to ask. Finally it was Renee that did.

"Did, did you kiss Neil without his consent, Nicky?"

Nicky looked terrified. "Well when you put it like that. Look it was that first night in Colombia, I was drunk and he looked hot and I mean it's not like I- ahhhh"

Suddenly Nicky was pressed up against the wall with a knife to his throat. 

"You. Did. What?" Andrew hisses as he presses the knife closer to Nicky's throat. Just a little harder and it would draw blood.

Neil slid of Matt's back and landed as soft as a cat on the ground. The foxes stood frozen in place. None of them made a move to interfere with what was in front of them. On one hand they had Andrew, red eyed and out for blood, possibly more like a monster then they had ever seen him. On the other they had Nicky, who this time had done something more then open his mouth to end up on Andrew's bad side. Allison, who almost had had her neck broken for slapping Aaron, saw in just how much danger Nicky was in and spoke up.

"You said it was that first night in Colombia? The night you drugged Neil?" She stepped forward and Nicky looked at her with eye as wide as dinner plates. Slowly he nodded, the motion driving the knife closer into his neck drawing blood. 

"Well then, monster, this is just as much your fault." 

"Allison.." Neil's said in both a warning and pleading voice as he saw where this was going.

"If you hadn't drugged Neil then Neil would've been able to defend himself, to shove Nicky off. You might not have broken any of your own twisted rules but you gave Nicky the means too. This is just a much your fault."

The foxes stood in tension, waiting for a motion, a movement, a reaction. They stood and watch a thin line of blood run down Nicky's neck. Suddenly there was a clang of the knife hitting the floor. Andrew backed up seemingly unmoved, and turned away. Neil ran after him, reached for his arm and got a hissed "no" in return. Neil stopped dead in his tracks and watched Andrew walk away.


	2. Chapter 2

Andrew didn't believe in regret, he still didn't, but if he ever would feel something close to that it would be now. He felt sick, he felt as if someone had emptied his stomach, he felt hollowed out and empty. Allison had had a point, if he hadn’t drugged Neil, Nicky would never have been able to get his hands on him. He knew Nicky wouldn’t, a year after Baltimore he knew he still hadn’t seen all that Neil was capable of, not when it came to violence. A kid that grew up the way Neil had did not only learn how to fight back, they learned how to win and Andrew had taken the opportunity to do either from Neil.

It was almost two hours since the game ended. Andrew had spent most of it driving, trying to drive away his thoughts the same way Neil did while running. He knew he had to go back eventually, he knew Neil was waiting for him on the roof, he knew they had to talk about it but what could he say? What could he do to change what he’d done? How could he ever look at Neil again?

_“I won’t be like them, I won’t let you let me be”_

But he had let someone else be that. 

He wanted to drink, he itched for a smoke but right now he was driving and he wouldn’t drive drunk. He didn’t even know why he was driving, he wasn’t a runner like Neil, he didn’t run from his problems but maybe just maybe he wanted to feel close to Neil, do what Neil would’ve done but in his own way. Maybe he wanted to feel close to Neil one last time before losing him. 

How could Neil look at him after this?

He knew Neil would though, he knew that stupid idiot would explain it away, understand why he had done it, understand, understand, understand. He would understand and respect, the way he did with Andrew when he didn’t want to be touched, when he waked up from a nightmare, or that time he had hit Neil so hard he couldn’t be able to play for a week when he had accidently pressed up against Andrew in his sleep. Neil would understand when Andrew couldn’t.

So the question was really, how would Andrew move past this? He had to if he didn’t want to lose Neil. And he wouldn’t do that, Andrew decided, he wouldn’t lose Neil. Which meat that there was only on thing to do.

He made a very illegal u turn and turned back to campus.

He turned the car onto the parking lot and sat there with his head against the steering wheel for a long while. He knew he had permission to do this, it didn’t make it easier. He straightened his back and exited the car and went to the small house near the school.

“Andrew?” Bee Dobson’s face looked down on him with bewilderment but in a second the face fell into her professional features. “What happened, what’s going on?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please tell me if you are interested in even more after this?


	3. Chapter 3

If Neil had been another person, say Andrew, Allison would be thrown up against a wall. Maybe she could tell how mad he was because she chose drive back to the fox tower alone. Neil had wanted to run, but he couldn’t risk Andrew coming back to Neil gone. If Neil started to run now he might never stop, at least not for a long time. He didn’t want to think.   
He knew that what Nicky had done had been wrong, that there were way more effective way to drug someone and far less assaulting ways but back in the moment Neil had been more worried about getting drugged than getting kissed. 

He also knew that Andrew drugging Neil that first time had stopped him from shoving Nicky off both the first and the second time. The drugs that Nicky had forced into Neil’s mouth continued to make it harder to shove him off. He knew those additional drugs had been Andrew’s idea just as he knew that the way he had gotten them wasn’t the way he had intended.

However, Andrew wasn’t responsible for that. He wasn’t responsible for Nicky’s actions. They were Nicky’s choice and Andrew was as little responsible for them as Nicky were for Andrew’s actions. 

He drove back with the upperclassman minus Allison and they sat in silence the whole way. Renee sat in the back with Neil and she put a hand on his knee in shown support.

Allison had tried to help Nicky, Neil tried to focus on that rather than the fact that she might have destroyed the most important thing in Neil’s life.

How would Andrew see what Neil saw, how would Andrew be able to move on?

They got to the fox tower before Allison and Neil stood watch outside to make sure he caught her. If he didn’t talk to her now, talked this straight, he might never be able to go near her again and he didn’t want to lose her as a friend. 

He had to make her understand.

She came walked to the tower, shoulders hunched and he knew he had come to the same conclusion has him.

“I know you’re mad but just think about it. I didn’t say anything that wasn’t true”

“Yes, you did,” Neil all but hissed. “You’ve had it out for Andrew ever since he almost broke your neck. Understandable, sure. But I don’t see you going around blaming Nicky for that.”

“Of course not he-“ 

“Is not responsible for Andrews actions” Neil interrupted. “Just Andrew isn’t responsible for Nicky’s. If you thought a little further than your hatred for Andrew you’d see that.”

“I do, but if he hadn’t drugged you-“

“I’m not saying it was okay to drug me, I’m saying that that Nicky taking advantage of that isn’t Andrew’s fault.”

“I said it to get Andrew of off Nicky” Allison insisted.

“Maybe, but you knew, after Colombia you must have known, what that would do to Andrew. You must have realized by now what you have done.”

“I know, I’m so sorry. I didn’t think further than to save Nicky’s life and can you blame me?”

“You could pull of Andrew from Kevin you could’ve done the same here, or let me talk him down like I did when he went for you. You know all of that I know you do. So why?”

“He is so particular about consent, and yet he let this happen.”

“You wanna blame someone for the kiss, blame Nicky, he was the one who did it."

Neil went in to the fox tower leaving Allison behind. He knew Allison loved him like a brother, and that she was genuinely sorry for doing what she had done, but Neil wasn’t sure he could forgive her if this didn’t work out.

He thought about calling Andrew but Andrew needed to work this though on his own, and Neil needed to work this through too before talking to him.

So he did the only logical thing he could think of: he went to Renee.


	4. Chapter 4

Nicky felt as if though he would throw up. He knew what he had done to Neil was wrong, he knew the way he had talked earlier, the comments he’d made, were wrong. He knew all of that now, had known for a while but how did you bring that up in a conversation, how did you apologize for something like that. Over the past year, he had tried to make it up for Neil, in small gestures that he had hoped that was enough. He also knew that what Allison had said was wrong, he and he alone was responsible for what he had done but how could Andrew see that? He had a tendency to blame himself and when it came to consent…

Nicky’s actions may have ruined the most important thing in Andrew’s life. He had seen what Andrew looked like without Neil while in Baltimore and he never wanted to see that again. He had never seen his cousin so broken, not even in Colombia with Drake and now, now he might have insured that happening. Sure, he hadn’t been the one to say that it was Andrew’s fault but he was the one who had done something Andrew would blame himself for.

Nicky would gladly be back against the wall with a knife at his throat if it would change that. Andrew had been mad, but Nicky as fairly sure Andrew wouldn’t have stabbed him. Neil would have stopped him in any case, Nicky knew that. No matter what Nicky had done Neil didn’t want him hurt, and he didn’t want Andrew in prison.

Mostly he wanted to go back two year and shake his former self and tell him to get some sense and decency in his body. He would do most anything rather than seeing that… _look_ on Andrews face again.

He was hiding out in the “monsters’” bathroom to avoid the others, and for the first time he really felt like that, like a monster.

What would he do? How could he make this better? He knew he had to help them, but hell if he knew how. It felt as if anything he did would just worsen the situation.

Nicky had heard Neil come in to the dorm area and almost expected to be hunted down, but the footsteps had walked past the monsters’ door.

He felt even worse after that, he didn’t want Neil and Andrew to break up but he wanted to lose either of them even less. Would he and Neil be able to joke around after this? Nicky wasn’t sure he could look Neil in the eye, much less touch him ever again. Neil had become a solid point in Nicky’ life, someone he could count on, not be scared of and who wouldn’t throw around homophobic comments every time he talked about Erik.

And Andrew? What would happen with him and Andrew? They had finally gotten a better relationship when Nicky had stopped making those comments and Andrew had in his turn stopped throwing Nicky up against the wall.

Nicky hanged his head and cried, what on earth had he thought he was doing that first night in Colombia?

He took a few deep breaths and still crying he picked up his phone.

“Erik? Hi. I- oh god I, I think I’ve really screwed up this time”


	5. Chapter 5

When Betsy Dobson told Andrew Minyard that he could show up at any time if he needed her help she had thought he would at least have the decency to show up in day time.

Now sitting in her living room, or well her sitting, Andrew pacing the floor, at around 10pm she thought she should’ve figured this was how it would go down.

Betsy thought that if there was a time when Andrew had been more frantic it would have been in Baltimore, but as she hadn’t been there, this was by far the worst state she had seen Andrew in.

In Colombia, Andrew had been drugged up to high heaven, and to traumatized to care about what was going on. Now in a situation that to an outsider might seem like a drop in the ocean in all that Andrew had done, Andrew was a mess. Betsy understood why; Andrew had borders and moral grounds that may seem ridiculous to some people but made sense to him. Drugging Neil had been a means to an end, a way for Andrew to size up the damage Neil could possibly do to the rest of Andrew’s crew. However, violating sexual consent, or giving someone else the means to was unforgivable.

It hadn’t been Andrews fault, but Andrew blamed himself for it all the same.

Betsy didn’t think Andrew blamed himself for drugging Neil, but for what the consequences had been for Neil. It was her job to help Andrew see what and what not he was to blame for.

“Andrew, why don’t you tell me what happened in Colombia that first night, for your point of view, what did you do?”

So, Andrew went through it and Betsy listened with her best neutral features. A reaction wasn’t what Andrew needed right now, no matter which it was, what Andrew needed was to move on from his own initial reaction to blame himself for actions out of his control.

In Colombia, she had known what to do. He hadn’t wanted her there but she had known he needed her. He needed her to bring hot chocolate and something normal, something far away from what he had just experienced. As little as Andrew had cared then, about what Drake had done to him, as much had he cared about Aaron. About whether or not Drake had gotten his hands on Aaron and what would happen to Aaron after what he had done.

Most of all Andrew had needed a small moment of normal before what was about to come. Betsy knew that the treatment and withdrawal would go hard on him just as she knew he had already figured out that she was going to send him to get it done.

You could say a lot of thing about Andrew, most of them untrue, but he wasn’t stupid or slow. Neither was he oblivious, least of all to his own feelings.

She remembered how frustrated he had been when he first started developing feelings for Neil. Sexual at first and Andrew had thought it would stay as that but Betsy doubted it. He talked too much about Neil for him to be just a make-out partner. It wasn’t until after Baltimore when Andrew had walked into her office simply saying: _I’m not losing him,_ that she had under stood just how much Neil meant to Andrew.

And now Andrew thought he might lose him, and he would unless he could move on from this. He would never be able to have a relationship with Neil if he thought he had violated him.

She knew Andrew knew this, it was why he was here.

“Andrew, you don’t know in what context Nicky kissed Neil and you are hardly responsible for a situation you had nothing to do with.”

“I told Nicky to keep drugging Neil, my guess is that’s why he kissed him, to force the drugs into his mouth. If I had just taken to drugging Neil on my own it wouldn’t have happened.”

“Andrew, I imagine there are more effective ways to drug someone than to kiss them, like you just said: if you would’ve done it, it wouldn’t have happened. You couldn’t know that Nicky would do it that way.”

Andrew stopped pacing and turned to Betsy. “You should’ve heard the way he talked about Neil before, I shouldn’t have left Neil alone with him.”

Betsy leaned forward in her chair. “Listen to me Andrew, you are not responsible for actions of others, you could not have known what Nicky would do or you would have stopped it. You. Are. Not. Responsible. For. Actions. Of. Others.”

Andrew looked at her with a blank face but Betsy knew that that meant that she had calmed him down enough for him to listen. Even if he didn’t agree with her he would always listen to her opinion.

“Now, let’s put on some hot coco and talk this through.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, bet you all thought i was dead in a ditch by now?   
> I'm sorry for the long wait between updates but life isn't at it's best atm.  
> Enough with excuses; i hope you like this chapter. BYE

Renee was leaning against the wall waiting for Neil outside of the girls’ dormitory.  Renee saw Neil’s curly hair as he came up the stairs. She leaned back against the wall of the girl's dorm and waited for him to come to her. She wasn’t sure if he wanted to or was ready to talk to her yet, but she had to give it a try. Losing Andrew wouldn’t be a hit Neil could walk away from easily. She suspected that Neil would handle losing Andrew just as well as Andrew had handled losing Neil back in Baltimore. Neil and Andrew would survive without the other but they wouldn’t really be living. Now they might fall apart, because of a mistake from the past and Renee couldn’t let it happen. So, when Neil came into the hallway from the stairwell which told Renee two things; one, Neil was too stressed for a confined environment; two, he was stressed enough that he needed to be on the move.

“We need to talk.”

Neil spoke before Renee had the chance. Apparently, he had come to the conclusion that he wanted to talk to her, which was good. It would make it easier to have him listen.

“Let’s go for a walk.” Being on the move would ground Neil enough to concentrate on a solution when he was this stressed. Neil turned around and Renee followed.  

They walked out of the fox tower in silence and well out onto the parking lot before Neil spoke up.

“It wasn’t his fault.”

“What Nicky did? No, but it was still wrong to drug you.”

“He had his reasons, I don’t blame him now.”

“He had his reasons, but it is still wrong. You might not blame him now, but you blamed him then and I guess you never resolved it.”

Neil opened his mouth to protest but before he could Renee interrupted him.

“Consent goes for more than sex Neil, remember that, and drugging someone is a breach of consent.”

Neil closed his mouth and they continued to walk in silence for a while.

“How do I fix it?”

“It isn’t yours to fix, you are not the one who have done something wrong.”

Neil sighed, “How do I help them fix it then?”

“Well first you have to figure out your own feelings regarding the matter; you say you don’t blame Andrew for drugging you, but do you blame Nicky? You don’t seem to be very upset with him?”

“I’m not, he didn’t do it to harm, he did it for family.”

“Neil, that doesn’t excuse anything.”

“What do you want me to say? That what Nicky did was wrong, and I- “ Neil stopped talking with a look of confusion. “I don’t know how I feel about it. Objectively I know it’s a problem but? I had my father come at me to hurt me so many times and later on the run my mother grabbing me to drag him out of sight on a bustling street and that stuff, always up in my space without asking, reaching for my hair and everything because they need to be quick and safe and unrecognizable and so I grew up always with someone else in my personal space and I knows that personal space exists for other people but I don’t really think about my own. So, what I'm trying to say is that I knows it wasn't a good thing and I kind of feel bad about it but at the same time I don’t really know how I feel or should feel about it.”

“Neil, you don’t have to feel any certain way, I understand that I may seem small in the bigger scheme of things for you but just so you know; you still have every right to be upset by this, just as you have every right not to be. There is no right way to feel, and no one can tell you that.”

Neil smiled a half-hearted smile, “What should I do now?”

“What do you want to do?”

“I want to make sure Nicky knows better than to do something like this again, with anyone, no matter the reason. I want to make sure this doesn’t completely ruin the relationship between Nicky and Andrew. Most of all I don’t want this to change the relationship I have with Andrew.”

“Then you should talk with them when they and you are ready, who do you want to talk to first?”

“Andrew. I don’t think I can face Nicky until I know Andrew and I are alright.”

“Then let’s go back and wait for him.”


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this chapter is so short, i'm just trying to get back to writing.

When Nicky finally stopped talking he had rambled on for about an hour and Erik had picked up on three things.

  1. Nicky had drugged someone.
  2. He had done this my kissing them without their consent, forcing the drugs into their mouth.
  3. Nicky might just have destroyed one of the two parts of the family he had fought so hard for.



And Erik, Erik didn’t know what to think. On one hand, what Nicky had don’t hadn’t been right, it had been horrible and wrong and he wasn’t sure if he could forgive Nicky for that, but on the other hand Nicky had done it for family, just like he had done everything else in his life. Erik, maybe, could understand him, but Erik needed to hear this from someone else’s point of view, from that someone’s point of view, from Neil. He needed to hear this form Neil. What had happened, what he had thought.

However, Erik wasn’t sure if he would ever get that confirmation, how could he ask that of someone he had never even talked to, Erik didn’t know. All he knew was that he loved Nicky more than anything else in the world and he knew that even the best people make mistakes. It might have been Andrew’s idea but Nicky had chosen to do what he did, and how he did it.

Erik needed to speak with this Neil guy, he had heard Nicky talk about him before about how Neil almost seemed to make Andrew happy, how he made him calm, how he made him human. He remembered when Nicky had skyped with him that first night Neil joined them and how Neil had told Nicky he couldn’t let Andrew push around him like that. He had remembered he had silently agreed with this Neil and wanted to know more about him but with everything that had happened with Neil, Andrew, Nicky and Aaron in the last year he had been even more intrigued by this mysterious newcomer. Now it seemed Erik finally had a reason to talk to him. He wasn’t sure if he could forgive Nicky but then again it wasn’t his to forgive. He needed to know, he needed to hear from Neil what had happened, if Neil could forgive Nicky. What Nicky had done hadn’t been an infidelity to Erik, he had been stupid, he had been drunk and would never in his life actually cheat on Erik, he knew that. Still doing that, without that someone’s consent, drugging someone, that wasn’t taking this too far. Erik wasn’t sure what to feel, all he knew that this was a complicated situation and that he would do his best for Nicky in it, because he knew Nicky could stand to lose his family.

He sat quiet on the phone for a long time while he heard Nicky sob on the other end. Then suddenly Nicky fell quiet and Erik almost thought Nicky had hung up until he heard him whisper.

“Erik? I’m so, so sorry.”

That’s when Erik found the courage and the words he needed to say.

“It’s not me you need to apologize to, Nicky. I’m not the one you’ve did most wrong. Find him and talk to him.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some excuses, since i updated last following this have happened.  
> 1) I got so depressed i was suicidal and was hospitalized, yeah not one of my finest moments.  
> 2) My dad died after a long time illness  
> 3) I got suicidal again (rn to be honest)  
> 4) I switched fandom and didn't have the motivation to write on this.
> 
> a big THANK YOU to everyone who has commented on this in the meantime, you are the only reason this chapter is published.

Andrew left Bee’s apartment with a mission and a sinking feeling of fear in his stomach. He supposed it was good that he was afraid. It meant he felt something, and if he felt something he wasn’t numb, and if he wasn’t numb… well it would either screw this up completely because hell knows he didn’t like feeling, or, or I just might help fix this. He tried to focus his fear as he did when he was up on the roof. Channeling it into a release, an escape, a motivation to never feel like this about something he couldn’t control. He wouldn’t lose Neil. He wouldn’t, Neil wouldn’t let him. Still Andrew needed to talk to him, he couldn’t let this slide, to grow and fester between them. He wanted something for the first time in so long, and it was Neil. While he cursed himself for letting himself want something he could lose – but it was too late to change. What he and Neil wasn’t nothing, he had known that since Baltimore, he and Neil were something and he didn’t want to lose it.

Still he wasn’t ready to face Neil yet, he didn’t have words, they tangled in his mouth and he swallowed them down like sharp pieces of paper, because how could they fit this situation? He drove around aimlessly but feeling less like running this time. He would go back to the tower, he just needed to sort through his thoughts first. It had seemed so simple when he had been with Bee, she had a talent for translating is thoughts into something that he could understand, she put words to his jumbled thoughts. However, now he had lost all those words and was left with thoughts that didn’t make sense. He needed them before he met with Neil. Needed them so he wouldn’t let Neil explain it away, needed them so Neil couldn’t just understand what Andrew’s thoughts and reasons had been, but so Neil would understand what Andrew thought now. That was the thing with Neil, a part that Andrew hated. Neil understood, he never questioned Andrew’s morals or reasons, because he knew what it was like, and what he didn’t know he still respected, and trusted that Andrew’s reasons were valid. Maybe not good enough reasons, like when he had almost broken Allison’s neck, but reasons Neil could rationalize. Understand from Andrew’s point of view. Andrew hated that, he hated Neil, he hated him for mattering, he hated that what they had had might never be the same. Because how could it? If Neil didn’t forgive him completely, Andrew could never put his hands on him again. But, forbid it, if Neil forgave him completely, forgave and put it in the past like he had already seemed to, what did that make of Andrew.

_I won’t be like them. I won’t let you let me be_

He had breeched consent. Not in the way he had meant, not in they way he ever thought imaginable. Not in a way he had considered consent. But he had, and it was one of the worst things he had done. He had left someone helpless to resist assault. He thought of himself at seven, too small to fight back, he thought of himself at twelve, too scared to resist. He thought of how helpless he had been, and how he had sworn to never be again. He thought of Aaron, whom he had given up Cass for, whom he had protected before knowing him. He thought of how he had killed their mother to save him. He thought of how he had witnessed of all those year with Drake to get Aaron out of a first-degree murder sentence. He thought of how he had sworn he would never let Aaron be helpless. How he had split up the foxes into Upperclassmens and Monsters, making sure they had someone to protect them, someone he trusted. How he wouldn’t let anyone be helpless again. Yet he had done just done that, and though the conversation with Bee had helped, he had a long way to go to forgive himself for that. He reminded himself he would, that knowledge being the only thing that made him turn the car around and go back to the tower. He would forgive himself, and he wouldn’t lose Neil.

When he got to the foxes’ tower he felt as if the building itself was holding it’s breath. He walked inside and up the stairs. There wasn’t a person in sight. He supposed a really pissed of Neil could do that. It wasn’t until he got to the communal area for the foxes before he saw someone. Renee was sitting on the floor obviously waiting for him. She gave him a nod and pointed towards the stairs leading to the roof. He nodded in return. When he walked past she caught his eye and he knew her expression from Bee.

_Come to me later._

**Author's Note:**

> Please comment if you want me to continue this because i have a few ideas


End file.
